A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Having monitored some of the reviews on Amazon and others, can I be allowed to say the following:

- If a book arrives damaged, it is not my fault but "Review" is what you thought of the book not the postal service or packing.
- If a book is described as a photo album book, don't criticize the author for not going into greater detail in the text. Photo book is just that with enhanced captions and an intro.
- I am no technical expert (unlike the likes of Mikael Olrog and others) which is why my books are described as "in combat" (something about which I do know something). I leave technical matters to the experts and stress this on the cover.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Good points 1 and 2. The 3rd is a bit mixed issue for e.g. Helion's "Tigers in Combat 3" is, despite its name, highly technical in its content so perhaps someone might expect something similar from other similarly titled books...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

As for photo books, e.g. Joshua Stoff's book on American aircraft production is definitely a photo book, but thanks to very extensive captions, it has substantial text as well. Perhaps authors/publishers should consider having similar substantial captions as standard...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Thanks Jukka-I knew you would rise to the challenge!

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Chris

Are you seriously saying that someone actually blamed you for receiving a damaged book from Amazon?

Unbelievable!! But as we use to say in Sweden. The last idiot has not been born yet....

Cheers
Stig

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Stig, it is very a very common occurrence among Amazon reviewers to give a 1-star review based on damaged condition, delayed delivery etc.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I understand very well the "photo book with too many photos". Years ago I was at IPMS-Rio de Janeiro anual contest seated at the Editora Adler table wich had released my book. I remember when one guy told he didn´t liked the book "cos it has only photos... Wow, almost 20 years searching for rare and not published images was not good to him...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Chris,

I suggest contacting amazon about the 'damaged books count as a review' issue. It is ridiculous but it will not change without complaints. I went looking for a book unrelated to history and saw several "reviews" where people posted photos of the damage on the copies they received.

Sometimes publishers are careful about the difference between a book with photos and captions and one with more detail. A few polite messages to the publishers appear to be in order.

I prefer books with a good balance of text and unpublished photos. The previously unpublished photos book is the winner between similar books. Unfortunately, to some book buyers, it is not their concern if the book took one year to write or 20.

Best,
Ed

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

No matter what you do for your book, some one won't like it.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Every kind of review, a book, a game, a plastic kit, a music, a movie or a tv series will not be 100% honest when the reviewer is unable to separate the technical aspects from his desire.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Prior to the internet, I went to the local hobby shop, looked over the books and bought what interested me. I was in one hobby shop/hobby game store where I was one of four people, including employees, when that fourth person came in, picked up a book, complained loudly to no one in particular and put it back. He then picked up something else, paid for it and left. That is the natural order of things.

I think it should be kept in mind that on the internet, the few can appear to be the many. After nearly four decades in book publishing, I know that the few are the few, not the many.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I think the whole Amazon reviews section is slowly dying (I don't know why) - there are far fewer reviews than there used to be.

It seems that to try and encourage people to give a grading, Amazon have recently introduced that you can leave an anonymous star rating without having to provide a written review.

I have noticed several seemingly 5-star books been downgraded because people (presumably trolls) have anonymously left a one-star grading without giving a reason.

If people give a one-star or five-star grading, they should have to explain their grading.

(Similarly, it must be a couple of years ago now since Amazon removed the thumbs up/thumbs down on reader reviews and you can only now like a review).

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

The rating system on amazon.com has broken down. When anonymous persons can take potshots at each other as opposed to giving a book a proper review, then I suggest amazon use actual reviews posted by actual people on credible sites or from other sources, like newspapers or magazines.

The reviews are now, in too many cases, more like a discussion forum.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Some years ago I got a one-star review for one of my P-47 books. It was titled: "Seller knows of deception but does nothing!" and read: "Just to warn everyone the cover shown is Vol.III, which is out of print. I have complained to the book seller of the deception, but to no avail. I guess it's easier to lie and cheat."
Boy, was I furious :)

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I was looking for the English language edition of a book about Argentinian aircraft. On amazon.com, the cover photo clearly shows that it is the English language edition, but in the title, it states French edition.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I smiled...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Which implies you prefer captions with few words like "An aircraft over England."...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

..once you hand the material over JJ anything can happen to it. I've just written my first two books..due out soon. My editor/publisher stuck rigidly to the word-count he'd imposed and cut ruthlessly. However once the designer had finished I was able to put quite a bit of the 'cut' material back into the captions where there was plenty of room...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Neil, was the editor limited by page count and "standard" design? If only the former, slight design changes can increase the space for text greatly.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I would suggest you don't talk crap about something you obviously know nothing about - i.e. my books.


https://i.imgur.com/UephOR4.jpg


https://i.imgur.com/MVj6Rmn.jpg


Buy the books and read my captions. Until then, DON'T make any kind of judgement call about the content and captions in my works. We can do without idiots like you making such comments...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

....The amount of research in a caption that extensive is quite simply phenomenal, not to mention time-consuming. Each word/sentence has to be checked and re-checked. I like the text block on the 'empty space' in the photo. Other choices involve potentially reducing the size of the image. There's far too much white space in some photo books.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Where did I say exactly that I referred to your books? I do suggest that you refrain from commenting on a comment you obviously don't understand. I surely can do without an idiot like you making such comments.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

This is what you said: “…Perhaps authors/publishers should consider having similar substantial captions as standard...”

I replied: “…I smiled…”

You then replied: “…Which implies you prefer captions with few words like "An aircraft over England."...

So you are clearly stating, in response to my comment ‘I smiled’, since you quoted it, that the implication is that I prefer captions with few words like “An aircraft over England.” Which is utter rubbish, and you are not qualified to make such an implication.

Now, when I came back at you showing with two examples that what you implied was clearly 100% incorrect, and called you out on it for what you are, you didn’t like it. Well, the fact is, you DID talk crap. And you DID make a judgement call on me. And you ARE an idiot for posting such unsubstantiated rubbish about me.

And I did understand your comment. Perfectly. If you are going to post throwaway comments on a public forum about authors, you should expect them to come back at you and show you up for being wrong when you are. And if you haven't got the spine, or the thick skin, to take those comments, then don't put your incorrect comments up in the first place, and then you won't get butthurt.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

OK, cool the insults or I will lock this thread. Can you not have a decent discussion without the insults?

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Wrong again. Take a look at any good dictionary for the exact definition of "to prefer". One may prefer A over B, but still end up doing B. As for the comment of what I believed you to prefer, it was based on your supposed smile (as I interpreted your "smile" to be akin to the smile on the face of Vasili Blohin when he shot "bourgeoisie vermin"). As for not having read your books, I have read 3 of them. All over 5 years ago.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I agree, John.

But if a guy lays allegations, then I feel I have to defend against unjust allegations. And I posted up proof in my defence.

You know me, John - I'm a straight shooter. You should have addressed this via PM to the other guy. It's people like him who drive researchers like myself and Chris Goss (and others I could name), who've done research way back into the pre-internet days, to consider not bothering to provide any further information from the fruits and expense of our many decades of research, given the attitude we see.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I don't know any of you, so my comment might lay the matter at rest.

John, all I will say is when I saw your post "…I smiled…” I didn't have the foggiest idea what you were talking about! Was that comment supposed to mean something to people? Because if it was, I don't think a lot of us "got it"...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

I'll answer that quite simply for you, Andy.

This is what the other poster wrote: "...Perhaps authors/publishers should consider having similar substantial captions as standard..."

Quite simply, he is telling authors that they should consider having substantial captions to the photos in their works. I replied 'I smiled', since I have always provided as much information as possible in captions in the 11 books I have written/co-written. I went further as the discussion continued by providing two examples of the kind of captions that I write. They are not the 4 or 5 words that Jukka sneeringly suggested I did, or liked.

And just to reinforce my point, here's another seven and a half lines of caption to the photo on this page:
https://i.imgur.com/iiNvdZc.jpg

So I hope you can now see the point I was making to the other poster - don't make presumptions about another person without the facts 100% to back you up.

TO JOHN BEAMAN: I am simply answering John's query, not seeking to stir things up any further...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Once again, I will try to play the impartial judge.

John, somehow you seem to have taken Jukka's comment "...Perhaps authors/publishers should consider having similar substantial captions as standard..." as a personal slight on you and your books.
It is surely just a general comment, which he is quite entitled to make.

Quite simply, you and Jukka seem to be misunderstanding each other's posts, which had lead to a pretty unnecessary slanging match...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Andy, It is a 'catch-all' phrase, and as such, embraces ALL authors. That's all that needs to be said. No misunderstanding on my part, although I do acknowledge that as English almost certainly is not his first language, his choice of words/phrase is somewhat unfortunate.

But then, if English is NOT your first language, one should be even more careful about what one says in that language about authors. Particularly when he quotes a specific author as the standard at which to aim for...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Regarding 'too much' white space. It takes years to learn or to train someone to do good page layout, which involves a number of factors. Most publishers cannot afford to hire book designers. I understand how it's done, and I have very bad examples in my collection. I want the information before anything else, including photos that are not too small. After that, it's hit or miss and I'm thankful there are more hits than misses.

I also know what it's like to turn in a manuscript and photos and having the publisher put the book together and not being satisfied with the end result. One hopes to have a publisher that is understanding and who is willing to listen, but that is sometimes not going to be the case.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Another plea from me. Authors do not set the price at which books sell and should there be a typo on the back cover, don’t blame the author as invariably the words are written by the publisher!

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Well....and what about if the printer in last minute makes a mistake with the text....although it was delivered 100% after proof reading a couple of times.....probably still my fault....anyway....it is what it is...

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Printers are requiring electronic files in the US. We used to do keylines but they stopped making the board on which they were pasted on.

As far as price, the publisher has the final say but the factors are finite.

1) What is the average price for a similar book?
2) What is the anticipated press run? At the company where I work, guesswork is replaced by a pre-order system which shows trends that influence the final decision regarding how many copies to print.
3) Production costs. After the total of what everyone involved gets paid is defined, then this is factored into the cover price.

Contracts. It should all be in the contract, or work agreement, for writers as far as payment, royalties and rights. Since I am not an attorney, I can only encourage everyone to have a contract reviewed by one before signing.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Who should I blame for texts littered with poor spelling and grammar.

This seems to have become so much worse in the last decade. Some of the major UK publishers are particularly blameworthy.

Is it that the original manuscript is being accepted and handled electronically without any proof reading, beyond the author? Writers can be quite bad at proof reading as they have read the text so often that they know what they have written before they read it.

£25 for a book with a typo every five pages is not worth it. It makes you begin to doubt the opinions and content

Martin

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Agree Martin. To err is human but more proof reading the better and yes, the author does become word blind. I have heard of some publishers accepting the MS as is. However, for my recent book, the editor proof read it, I re-read it after it was a pdf, my great friend in Germany proof read it as did two aviators....

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

And who should I blame for texts where the "numbers" information has clearly not been checked at all? I am finding that this is really common.
I've just read a book covering an esoteric eastern European type (I won't name it). It authoritatively lists loads of strike dates in the text (c 80 of the type served in that particular Air Force). However, if the author had bothered to write them all down he would have seen that aircraft X has been listed with three different strike dates, one in 1943, one in 1944, and one in 1945. Out of the (c 80) aircraft, no less than 9 are listed with more than one strike date, without any explanatory comment at all (and two have three different strike dates).
It almost seems as if some authors don't care about such "trivia".

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

The big 4 publishers in the US make sure a book goes through four edits. At the company I work for, there are three editors and a proofreader. Since good people cost money, dropping one or two is a cost savings. Anyway, if sales go down, publishers may have to hire more people.

One solution, which I offer only as a suggestion, is to post errata for a given book. Some may find this unfair but it may be the best or only answer for some publications. There is also the long-term problem of someone copying from a book with errors in the future.

I also suspect that there are a few people who think incorrectly about the present. That is, they think that for whatever reason, that things have changed. I can't be more specific. The bottom line is that nothing has changed when it comes to proofreading a book and having a certain level of skill.

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

It's certainly annoying to the reader and understandably so. I would feel the same as you do.

From the writer's point of view, it's not always easy to recognise the cross-references between things at different points in your text, e.g. to remember that Hans Schmidt's name or Werk Nummer 111999 also came up 100 pages ago. Being able to keep a sense of the whole thing in your head while writing individual sections is no trivial matter. It's much easier now that text is fully searchable but you still have to realise that this name/place/number might have come up elsewhere. The answer, I suppose is "check everything".

Re: A plea from me and no doubt other writers
 

Even though my company publishes fiction, a good portion contains references to existing weapons, aircraft and other things. It is not uncommon for a writer to give one value on page 20 and a different one on page 100. There are other examples. However, before computers, books were successfully kept (mostly) error free. So there are fewer reasons for things to be different now. For more errors.

I would add that work is still work. This is all I do for a living. And it takes time. With computers, some time has been shaved off but there has to be an understanding of capabilities. The computer cannot do everything. It is limited.